The Problem of 'Edwin Drood': A Study in the Methods of DickensNicoll, W. Robertson (William Robertson), Sir
General
The Problem of 'Edwin Drood': A Study in the Methods of Dickens
Nicoll, W. Robertson (William Robertson), Sir
Cathedrals in literature; Dickens, Charles, 1812-1870. Mystery of Edwin Drood; Murder in literature
Beneath Edwin and Rosa is, first, an allegorical female figure,
looking at a placard, headed ‘LOST,’ on a door. Under that again, is
a girl in a garden-chair; a young man, whiskerless, with wavy hair,
kneels and kisses her hand. She looks rather unimpassioned. I
conceive the man to be Landless, taking leave of Rosa after urging
his hopeless suit for which Helena, we learn, ‘seems to compassionate
him.’ He has avowed his passion, early in the story, to Crisparkle.
Below, the opium hag is smoking. On the other side, under the
figures of Jasper and the choir, the young man who kneels to the girl
is seen bounding up a spiral staircase. His left hand is on the iron
railing; he stoops over it, looking down at others who follow him.
His right hand, the index finger protruded, points upward, and, by
chance or design, points straight at Jasper in the vignette above.
Beneath this man (clearly Landless) follows a tall man in a ‘bowler’
hat, a ‘cut-away’ coat, and trousers which show an inch of white
stocking above the low shoes. His profile is hid by the wall of the
spiral staircase: he might be Grewgious of the shoes, white
stockings, and short trousers, but he may be Tartar: he takes two
steps at a stride. Beneath him a youngish man, in a low, soft,
clerical hat and a black pea-coat, ascends, looking downwards and
backwards. This is clearly Crisparkle. A Chinaman is smoking opium
beneath.
In the central lowest space, a dark and whiskered man enters a dark
chamber; his left hand is on the lock of the door; in his right he
holds up a lantern. The light of the lantern reveals a young man in
a soft hat of Tyrolese shape. His features are purely classical, his
nose is Grecian, his locks are long (at least, according to the taste
of to-day); he wears a light paletot, buttoned to the throat; his
right arm hangs by his side; his left hand is thrust into the breast
of his coat. He calmly regards the dark man with the lantern. That
man, of course, is Jasper. The young man is EDWIN DROOD, of the
Grecian nose, hyacinthine locks, and classic features, as in Sir L.
Fildes’s third illustration.
Mr. Proctor correctly understood the unmistakable meaning of this
last design, Jasper entering the vault:
‘To-day the dead are living,
The lost is found to-day.’
DR. JAMES’S VIEW
In the _Cambridge Review_ for 9th March 1911 Dr. James says:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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